The one who wants to give us a job is not Arne
himself. He is just a messenger for the guild master. In other words, our main
customer is the guild itself. And when an organization offers a job, it's
almost certain that the job is not going to be small.

“We are in an emergency.”

“Even so, it's still impossible.”

Before becoming a talisman smith, I'm also an
adventurer for about 4 years. And in that time, I become friends with many
people. One of them is the guy who currently sitting in front of me and Violet.

Werther. The master of the adventurer guild in this
town which looks significantly older than us.

Just like Arne, this old man also helped me a lot of
times. The one who vouches for my innocent after getting false accusation is
him. The one who gives me a job and place to stay after having all of my money
taken is also him.

I owe him a lot, and of course, when he got into a
trouble, naturally I want to help him as much as possible. But this time, his
request is simply too big for me.

“Let me tell you something, creating a talisman is not an easy task.”

Talisman is a material embedded with certain magical
properties, skill, or ability. Common people normally called it a magic tool,
but the truth is a magic tool is just one of the product using a talisman.

To put it simply, if a magic tool is a machine than a
talisman is its parts.

Unlike in some novel that I read in the previous
world, magic in this world is not just about imagination, writing some letter,
chanting a spell, or giving some flashy move a cool name.

You can't just shout “Hear my words and burn mine
enemy” like a chuuni and hope some big fireball would appear in your hands. In
fact, a chant is normally very short because it's only used as a keyword.

The only one who can do something like that in this
world are people who have direct access to some higher being like a spirit or
something similar and people with special skill or ability.

For spirit or any other being with higher spiritual
power able to alter the world laws to a certain extent. This ability make them
can ignore anything and just ask what they wanted.

You can say that the world would obey their rule for a
brief time. That's why their power mostly called as a divine or evil power
depends on who you ask

For people like them, they got special ability or
skill when somehow some magic circuits are forming up inside their body or
their spiritual body is bigger than their physical body.

While the rest of people like me usually have to
create external medium to be able to manipulate a magic.

Magic in this world is like an electricity or chemical
reaction. It can be used for wide range of thing just by manipulating its
properties. And the one who creates tools for doing it are talisman smith like
me.

As a side note, normal talisman have the shape of metallic
charm or small printed circuit board.

“We can prepare the material.”

“What we lack the most is time.”

As I have said, making talisman is difficult. Making a
talisman is like creating a printed circuit board for electronics. And with the
current 'not so advanced' technology, mass producing something is impossible to
do. In other words, I have to manually draw the manipulations path calculation,
inscribe the design, tune and test it one by one.

“I'm very sorry, even I work day and night at most I can only produce 10
talismans per day, and my workshop only has 2 people.”

Of course, I didn't want to work without rest either.
Creating a talisman is delicate work, if I make even a single mistake I have to
start from scratch again.

“And you are asking me to create mental fortitude, body strengthening,
and stamina boosts talisman where each of them is 100 pieces in a week.”

That's 300 pieces of talisman in total. A 2 months
worth of works. Something that's impossible to do in a week.

“I honestly want to help, but my help alone can't solve this problem.”

“I'm really sorry, I also thought that my request is stupid.”

In other words, he is rather panicked because he
wanted to finish the problem as fast as possible. And if the problem is even
able to make someone as experienced as him panicked, that problem is absolutely
big. Just like this stupid request of his.

“So, can you start to explain what the real problem is? I mean I just
being told to create so many talismans but I haven't heard its purpose yet.”

Because I'm no longer an adventurer or even this guild
member, I didn't have any access to their information network and my status is
the same as an ordinary civilian. Maybe because that restriction no one has
told me what the main problem is.

Normally I didn't really care to be treated as an
outsider by them, but this time I need to know what kind of threat that they
want to face. After all, their request in impossible for me to accept. So, I
want to help them through another means.

The guild master stares at the other guild officer to
seek their consent. After that, they give him some kind of approval sign the
guild master redirect his sight to me and Violet.

“The truth is, we got information that a giant is currently moving
towards this town after destroying many villages and town in its path, it would
arrive in this area around 10 days.”

There are so many races that live in this world that
roughly can be divided into 4 main categories. The myth who didn't possess flesh
and exist only as a spiritual being like angel, spirit and gods. The legend who
has a strong spiritual body inside their physical body like demon, elf, and
vampire. The beast who inherently have a far stronger body than any other race
like dragon, cerberus, minotaur or other divine beast. And the last one is
human which somehow didn't have any special trait except their astonishing
craftiness.

Except for the beast people, the legend regarding the
other 2 fantasy-like race is the same as the one in my previous world. Even
their traits, specific names, and the myth surrounding them.

Based on my dumb theory, there is a chance that the
origin of the people in my previous lord is someone from this world. After all,
in that world, there's no actual proof that magic, gods, demon and the likes
actually exist.

So, maybe they have many tales about them because they
are actually from this world where every myth from my previous world is an
actual entity.

“Is this town its aim or ……”

“I don't know? but at least we know that it was pureblood! that's why I
want to subjugate it as fast as possible.”

Besides their own subspecies, they also can still be
divided into 2 categories. A pureblood or mixed blood. Pureblood is a term for
a creature who hasn't changed since ancient time. In another word, a creature
that already presents since this world exists.

Mixed blood is as it sounds. A race that born from the
relationship between 2 different race, and the majority of this world resident
today is part of a mixed race. Of course, myth race is an exception because
they didn't even have any flesh or blood to be mixed.

Violet is one sample of mixed blood between beast and
human where the human parts are dominant in her body.

“I see.”

So why did the pureblood are dangerous for this town?
The answer is simple. Because they haven't changed or adapted.

Pureblood that live since the dawn of the world
existence is a creature that created to be able to resist the harshness of the
ancient world. And in order to be able to live in the dangerous world, most of
them have an astonishingly tough body, unimaginable strength, or even great
magical capability.

Now imagine if that kind of monster didn't have enough
intelligence to understand words or only have some basic instinct like kill the
annoying thing, eat anything that can be eaten or destroy everything inside an
area that it claims as a territory.

Of course there’s always exceptions like a legendary
dragon who actually very knowledgeable, fox which have human slyness, or
mermaid who can easily deceive humans. Which most likely have the ability to
breed with other races, hence giving birth to a lot of mixed blood offspring
which currently roaming on the world.

But most of purebloods are simply a beast.

They would bring a big chaos because we can't even
communicate with them. That's why pureblood like Giant is considered as dangerous.

“I think the scale of the problem is too big for this guild.”

This guild only has around 150 people registered as an
adventurer with half of them are a low-level one. In other words, only about 70
people can actually be considered as war potential. And that number is
absolutely not nearly enough to face a giant that can blow a house with its
sneeze alone.

“An army is already sent to this place to subjugate it.”

I see. If the giant is already spreading some
destruction it's not strange for the nation to take some action.

“So when they are going to arrive?”

“Around a week.”

“I understand the situation.”

Marching is a tough thing to do and managing army with
a thousand soldiers in it is an even more difficult task to do. The chance of
the army able to arrive at the promised time is rather slim. In the worst case
scenario, the adventurers have to hold out until the army arrive if the giant
is moving faster or the army is simply late.

He needs that talisman in order to boost the
adventurer combat ability and moral support so no ones are going to just flee
from the town to save their own self.

I sighed deeply. Talking about priority to a people
who haven't faced an absolute difference in power with his enemy is rather
difficult. His answer is the typical answer from someone who always thinks that
facing problem directly is the one only way to make it disappear.

“Violet do you understand what I'm trying to say to him?”

“Of course.”

“Can you replace me talk to them?”

“Why?”

“Impression.”

“I see.”

A different person can give different impression to
another people. And it seems I give the impression that I'm the same type of
person like them. That's why he fails to understand what I'm trying to convey.

It's like when some muscle head asks you to use
tactics to defeat your enemy while the person himself able to defeat his enemy
with his single punch. Making you think that tactics are actually useless.

“Guild master what is our main objective.”

After sipping the tea that the guild staff prepared
for us, Violet begins to speak.

“Defeat the giant.”

“Wrong! our main objective is to protect this town while defeating the
giant are just one of the few way we can achieve it.”

“But leaving it alone is danger…”

“Did we still need to kill it if that giant stays in…hm…like some remote
island and doing nothing.”

The answer is no. Why did we even bother doing
anything to it if it didn't threaten us? Leaving it alone is the best possible
decision you can take and intentionally disturbing is nothing but foolishness.

“Are you saying that we need to leave it alone Violet-san?”

Violet is already adult even though her body is that
of 9 or 10 years old girl so even the guild master is trying to use polite
words. But, it seems she is saying something that triggers the against the
guild master's principle. I can feel a little irritation from his voice.

“Well, that's not entirely unreasonable! we can prioritize the lives of
the townspeople and relocate them to somewhere else while letting the giant to
pass the city.”

That's can be done, and with that, we can even save
the adventurer by just focusing on relocating all the peoples in the town. But
of course, in reality, that method is very difficult to execute.

“That's crazy.”

Moving large number of people is difficult, finding a
suitable place to stay, and creating a temporary residence for them is a very
big and heavy task. In another word that method is not practical. Not to
mention that the giant can wreak havoc in the empty town or even hunting the
resident like a pest.

“Yes, it's crazy.”

“If you know it's a crazy idea then don't propose it.”

“I just presenting some method that maybe can work for a weakling like
us.”

The method that Violet propose is the same as giving
up on your wealth after some bandits show up while asking them not to kill you.
A very normal response from some weak people who are unable to offer even some
little resistance.

“Weakling you say?………”

Uwah… he is so pissed right now. I'm sorry, she just
wants to slightly twist your way of thinking and absolutely didn't just want to
insult you guild master.

“Well…… you can claim to be strong after you can defeat master in a
fight.”

You sound like typical arrogant antagonist right now.
I like it. Especially that cold eyes that look like going to freeze someone's
heart. But please don't use my name to threaten someone. Because in an honest
one on one fight I'm absolutely weaker than the person in front of you my
beloved wife.

“If you are too scared, I can even replace master…”

Nononono…… that's simply no. I'm never going to let
you play around with another man.

“Tha……”

“Let's back to the main topic, relocating the townspeople maybe a rather
difficult but relocating the giant is a different matter.”

“Relocating the giant?”

“Yes.”

Our priority is not defeating the giant but saving the
town. And in order to do that, we can just need to alter his path to not
collide with the town.

“With that, we can keep away the giant from the town and by not directly
fighting it we can lower the casualty on our side.”

A Giant is boasting absolute strength that
incomparable to that ordinary human. Fighting it directly is pretty much just a
suicide. Even if they are able to miraculously win, I'm very sure that the
sacrifice is not going to be small.

“Giant is not that smart, with some provocation we can lead it to some
isolated place and wear down its stamina while waiting for the reinforcement to
arrive.”

“Aren't it just going to make it goes frenzy and attack the town
faster?”

“That's why master asked if the town is its true aim or not?”

“Sorry.”

“I didn't think that the giant already knows the position of this town,
but just to be safe let's focus on gathering more information about it first.”

“I understand.”

With her task to make the guild master understand what
I want to say, Violet sit back beside me like before.

What we desperately need to know first is about its
purpose in making its journey. Is it hunger? is it some kind of retaliation? is
it just some simple stroll, or is it having something to do with some deeper
circumstances?

Depend on its main motivation, we need to prepare a
different kind of bait to lure it out outside the town.

“Um. am I allowed to speak?”

“Of course.”

One of the female officials of this guild raise her
hands and ask for permission to speak to us. Based on her getup she is not the
type of person like the muscle head guild master. She radiates some kind of
intelligent aura.

By the way, I didn't know who is she. Is she a new
member?

“Even we didn't have any detailed info about the giant yet, there have
been some related reports after it crossed the national border.”

“Is that so? it really helped a lot if you can share it with us.”

The female worker once again asks the guild master for
permission and he nodded lightly. After that, she brings a map and spread it on
the table in front of us.

“Based on the report, it first sighted about a month ago, after that, it
moved from village to village until its current position.”

The map she shows looks familiar to my eyes. After
all, I already explained that the geographical feature of this world is pretty
much the same as my old world. Thought the name of cities or country and their
border has some a slight changes.

“Can you mark the place that it passed on this map? I want to see the
pattern in its movements.”

If we know its movement pattern we can guess what kind
of thought it has.

The female worker begins to mark some area on the map
while also giving some brief explanation on what's happening in the said place
and also the how much casualty it caused.

But of course, the information is not that much, after
all, it’s just information we got from the national border and one neighboring
country.

“Is it hunger after all?”

“I doubt it.”

It attacked the many villages in its path so I assume
that it just want to eat. But it seems Violet has a different opinion.

“From its random movement, we can discard the possibility that it has
some clear destination in mind.”

If something has some clear objective in mind, usually
even the dumbest animal still going to use the shortest route available. But
the movement of this giant is not even consistent with any particular
direction. There's even a record of it going back and forth in the same place
over and over again.

“If it just looking for food it also didn't need to destroy every
building in its sight.”

It can just grab some tiny panicked human to eat
without even first destroying everything in the village. It also didn't need to
visit the village that already destroyed. After all, most people would seek refuge
in some other place after such a disaster.

There are many cases of some pureblood destroying
humans property. But it usually triggered by something like they got attacked
first, or they feel that their territory has been invaded by humans. When it
happened, they would run wild, but the scale usually only in the local area. In
another word, they usually only destroy the thing in their own domain.

They shouldn't have actively looked for a new place to
destroy.

“Also, she said that there's hardly any casualty among the villager! for
disaster in this scale, it's too odd.”

It's Indeed strange, also when I see the pattern again
I spot some village that didn't get attacked by it even though it should have
been easier to deal because the location is rather isolated.

“Thank you very much…… ?”

“Lena.”

“Thank you very much Lena-san, that information is very precious for all
of us.”

With that information, we know that going to the less
densely populated area is safer, that it didn't have a real goal in mind, and
it didn't particularly fond of eating humans.

“We still need to know what kind of trigger that made it attack some
places or how it able to track humans settlement, but for now that much
information is enough for us to made some decision.”

“I'll look for more information.”

After they got more information, we can get more
material that we can use it to provoke that giant.

“Yes, please do! we need to ascertain its main objective to prevent the
same thing to happen in the future after all.”

The female worker goes back to her place after bowing
to us.

“Somehow you sound more like a guild master than me.”

“Sorry. I got carried away.”

I should remember that I'm no longer some important
person in this place and act like one. Having some outsider to give a command
to an organization is not good in every way.

“No, you didn't have to worry about it.”

No, you should worry about it guild master!

“Anyway, scarping the plan of fighting it directly is better for both adventurer
and me.”

If the adventurers are not forced to face the giant
directly, we didn't have to supply all of them with the same set of talisman.
If we just want to provoke it and lure the giant from the town, we can just
create a small team to do the task. If not all adventurer facing the giant at
the same time, we didn't have to create so many mental fortitude talisman for
everyone because they can just use it in turns.

“How about the other talismans?”

“I'll draw the manipulation calculation and you can ask some other
talisman smith to inscribe it.”

“Aren't it trades secret?”

“Well yes, but this is emergency! I can't be stingy, right? not to
mention having it spreading didn't really affect my business anyway.”

It's impossible for me alone to meet its deadline. The
best way to solve this problem is just not to be greedy and outsource the
manpower from outside my workshop. Also, my main business is creating household
appliance so there's no real damage done to me.

In a way, it even benefits me. I mean, if another
blacksmith can take my place in creating that talisman for the adventurer. I'm
not going to be bothered by them anymore.

Money is not a real problem for me and Violet. She
didn't demand luxurious lifestyle and I didn't particularly want to get rich
either.

“Are you sure?”

Well, I want to renovate our current house after we
have some kids though. But it's not going to happen tomorrow or next month, so
we didn't have to hurry.

I mean, we are pretty much just still going playing a
sticky-sticky game most the time without actually doing the main event. She
still rather afraid of men after all. So I didn't rush her.

“Yes, just make sure to give us a lot of gifts when we have kids.”

“You already thinking about having a kids?”

“Eh? isn't it normal?”

I mean, after marriage the next things is about having
kids and raising them right? Well, before I fell in love with Violet. I used to
think that suddenly marrying and having a child to take care of would be
troublesome, but when I mentally placed Violet as my partner, I suddenly
couldn't care less about all of that trouble. Instead, I'm really looking
forward to it.

“Now that mention it, it's indeed normal.”

“That's right, anyway since our talk is pretty much finished I want to
go home! you can tell the number of talismans you need to me tomorrow after you
guys organize the fishing team.”

I hold Violet's hand and bow before standing up and
ready to go home.

“Wait a minute.”

Before we are able to reach the door, Arne holds my
other hand and stop us.

“Having another man holding my hand is rather unpleasant.”

Usually, he would snap and give some rhetoric answer.
But this time he stays silent and just stares at the guild master.

“What? is there any more thing we need to discuss?”

For some reason the atmosphere is rather heavy.

“No, not really, I just want to ask something.”

Why everyone looks so serious?

“How about come back being adventurer?”

“Ha? why?”

Many children have a dream of being an adventurer. In
their eyes adventurer are a strong person who risks their life for the goodness
of mankind, a hero basked in glory and wealth. And of course, I once thought
the same.

Unlike official soldier in the national army, most
adventurers didn't have stable income, insurance, and always have to carry the
risk of their task alone. Sometimes, a low-level adventurer is even poorer than
an ordinary farmer.

“In the past, I didn't really care about my own lives, that's why I can
recklessly bet my lives on the line for that dangerous job.”

At that time I'm alone in this world. If even I
disappeared no one would miss me, no one would care, and no one would cry for
me. If I can stay alive, no one would welcome me either. In the past, I
struggle to stay alive just because I'm afraid the pain of dying.

I didn't really have any dream to realize in this
world, and I didn't really have anyone that I think important. In other words,
I didn't have any attachment to this world.

“But it's different now.”

I grasp Violet hand a little stronger.

“I have someone that I want to protect and made to be happy, that's why
I didn't want to work in a place where I can die anytime.”

After all, I didn't want to leave her alone and just
become her source of sadness. I want to stay with her as long as possible.

“Then, will you come back to become an adventurer when that person is no
longer exist?”

Ha?

“What do you mean by that?”

“Eh?…”

Don't eh me! what did you mean by that? I really want
to know. Can you give me more detail about it?

“Guild master!!!!”

Arne called the guild master with a panicked voice.
After that, the guild master somehow gets pale in the face when looking at me
while the other members of this guild office looks petrified in their place.

“I'm sorry. That's not what I mean.”

“Then what do you mean?”

“You are strong enough to brush off most danger even in this line of
works.”

“Strong huh……”

What a nostalgic word. I also think the same some
years ago. But I'm not that naive anymore.

“Let me tell you something guild master.”

I open the door in front of me and said.

“Humans are weak! And there are so many foes that we can't hope to match!”

And we leave the guild office.

After going home, both of us immediately begin to work
on drawing the design for the talisman requested from us. Later in the evening,
someone from the guild takes our base template to be used by another talisman
smith.